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Presidential Visits

Sunday, September 24, 1911

[caption]Image: President William H. Taft[/caption]

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President Barack Obama visited the University of Kansas on Thursday, January 22, 2015. His talk focused on the middle class economics such as the cost of attending college, student loans, health insurance and the minimum wage.

The visit brought with it a lot of questions about visits by sitting U.S. presidents to the KU campus.

President Obama was the first sitting president to visit KU since William Howard Taft (left) visited Lawrence on September 24, 1911. Taft spoke in old Robinson Gymnasium to a welcoming mass of people, then left for a short talk at the Haskell Institute, before departing for Baldwin City.

The first visit, according to the book "Across the Years on Mount Oread," appears to have been made by Ulysess S. Grant in April 1873. As was the case with Rutherford B. Hayes in 1879, Grant visited the second building on the KU campus, University Hall, or Fraser Hall, as it was later named. This structure was considered the largest educational building in the United States at the time of its completion, so it was considered quite the attraction.

In Brief

Union Rises. The first known U.S. president to visit the University of Kansas was Ulysses S. Grant. Grant's visit, in April 1873, included a tour of the recently opened University Hall (old Fraser Hall). The Hall was purported to be the largest educational building in the United States at the time of its construction.

Talk About A Breathtaking View. In 1879, the newly christened University Hall welcomed President Rutherford B. Hayes, First Lady Lucy Hayes, and General William Tecumseh Sherman. “The party were delighted, as everybody is, with the noble view,” noted a local newspaper. Some reports, however, suggest that the President was winded by the climb to the top floor and thus delivered a much shorter address to the student body than had been originally anticipated.

[caption]Image: The White House[/caption]

A Jayhawk President. Well, not a U.S. president, but KU can also claim a presidential visit from Juan Manuel Santos, President of the Republic of Colombia. Santos became the president of Colombia on August 7, 2010. He graduated from KU with a Bachelor of Science in Business in 1973 and returned to KU for a visit on September 24, 2012.